my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

[john - lp]

I bought dbpoweramp so I could rip my music collection to flac.

Now I am ripping CD no. 557 and think I have experienced the problems that are.

Most of my CD’s have been played no more than 5 times as I first ripped them to MP3, found the quality of sound not satisfying, then ripped them to variable or highest bit rate, still MP3. Bought an iPhone and with that iTunes and ripped to lossless. Got tired of iPhones and now rip to flac.

Most of the CD’s ripped without problems, several had 1 or 2, 3 tunes not ripped perfect, re-ripping the imperfect ones usually made them turn out perfect (according to dbpoweramp).

Some of the more presumable high quality (expensive) CD’s, among them a few Sheffield Gold (24 Kt. Gold coating), refused to rip corrects. All my music has been bought as new and they all look pristine.

Funny in Exact Audio Copy (free) some of them they ripped correct but without cover picture and in Easy Audio Copy (trial) some of them also came out with message that they were correct ripped.

A few of my very old CD’s refused to rip at all and one of them would not play on my B&O CD player. CD’s do not last forever.

I rip to flac in the highest level 8 even though it is not what is recommended, but suppose that highest level would be best quality since they call it highest. Maybe it will use a bit more storage space but with the price for that now it is less important than music quality.

And: Yes. I think this program is one of the best there is. I have been wrong before and living longer I probably will be that again.

[mville]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

Most of the CD&*8217;s ripped without problems, several had 1 or 2, 3 tunes not ripped perfect, re-ripping the imperfect ones usually made them turn out perfect (according to dbpoweramp).

Some of the more presumable high quality (expensive) CD&*8217;s, among them a few Sheffield Gold (24 Kt. Gold coating), refused to rip corrects. All my music has been bought as new and they all look pristine.

Funny in Exact Audio Copy (free) some of them they ripped correct but without cover picture and in Easy Audio Copy (trial) some of them also came out with message that they were correct ripped.

What do you mean by ripped perfect or correct ripped, are you referring to Accurate (as in AccurateRip) or do these include Secure rips?

I rip to flac in the highest level 8 even though it is not what is recommended, but suppose that highest level would be best quality since they call it highest. Maybe it will use a bit more storage space but with the price for that now it is less important than music quality.

The compression level used in flac, has NO effect on audio quality, whatsoever.

[Jailhouse]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

I rip to flac in the highest level 8 even though it is not what is recommended, but suppose that highest level would be best quality since they call it highest.

Level 8 is the highest level of compression and will result in the smallest files. However, as mville noted, audio quality will be the same no matter what compression level is used.

[john - lp]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

Level 8 is the highest level of compression and will result in the smallest files. However, as mville noted, audio quality will be the same no matter what compression level is used.

Silly me, I thought it was highest quality.

[john - lp]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

What do you mean by ripped perfect or correct ripped, are you referring to Accurate (as in AccurateRip) or do these include Secure rips?

The compression level used in flac, has NO effect on audio quality, whatsoever.

Yes accurate as in AccurateRip. When it tell me it is not accurate I thought it was not correct ripped. Do you know why they have 8 levels when in my mind 1 would be enough if the sound quality is correct (the best).

[john - lp]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

As I said earlier: CD's do not last forever. Even though they look like new 7 of my CD's will no longer play in my audio CD player and my computer tell me there is nothing on the CD. They are old but have been played very little as I first ripped to MP3 later to lossless Apple and now when no longer use iPhones I compress to flac. The lost CD's I have recovered from my hard disc drive and converted from lossless Apple to flac. And from now on I will rip in the recommended level 5 or is there any advantage in level 1?

Back up what you want to keep.

Anybody know if Micro-SD cards also loose what is in them?

[Dat Ei]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

Yes accurate as in AccurateRip. When it tell me it is not accurate I thought it was not correct ripped. Do you know why they have 8 levels when in my mind 1 would be enough if the sound quality is correct (the best).

It's just a question of data compression and file size (like zip), not sound compression.


Dat Ei

[garym]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

Yes accurate as in AccurateRip. When it tell me it is not accurate I thought it was not correct ripped. Do you know why they have 8 levels when in my mind 1 would be enough if the sound quality is correct (the best).

In the old days, some computer processors were not that powerful. Compressing a FLAC to 8 took more processing power (and took longer) than compressing to "1". So there were options. But in modern times, any cheap computer can handle the processing power with plenty to spare. And on your other issues:

1. compression of lossless file like FLAC has nothing to do with bit perfect copy of CD (or sound quality). It only relates to how small you can get the file that the audio is being stored in. These are LOSSLESS (bit perfect) files at whatever compression is used).

2. Not being in AccurateRip does NOT mean that the rip is not correct. Perhaps the CD is not in AR database yet or maybe the particular version of the CD is not in AR database. Even if not in AR database, you still get an indication of whether the rip is SECURE, or SECURE with a warning, or ERROR, etc.

[john - lp]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

Thank you all very much for your information.

[Masked Lapwing]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

Hi

john - lp asked:

"Anybody know if Micro-SD cards also loose what is in them?"

I don't see any answer so would like to ask that also, as well as USB Flash drives.

I have a bunch of 15 year old videos/photos of my baby/toddler on DVDs that I really need to migrate to a newer medium. I'd prefer not to use DVDs again as USB/SD is so much easier than the tedious task of burning. I'm also not interested in uploading them to "cloud" storage. Said videos would be stored away and seldom viewed. I also wish to keep the cost down.

I have previously looked elsewhere for trustworthy information on this topic but have usually just found the information confusing and or ambiguous. Nobody seems to be able say whether or not placing files on USB Flash drives or SD Cards (I prefer USB actually) would be a reliable solution. I would transfer the files to at least two different brands of USB/SD and make at least three copies of each file.

Many thanks.

[schmidj]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

First, flash memory, like USB sticks, SD cards, solid state "hard drives" for computers have definite lifetimes, particularly the number of write cycles. Manufacturers have "tricks" to somewhat extend the lifetime, which may or may not be less than the lifetime of a rotating mechanical drive. You may want to search google for more education on this.

Beyond that, these drives, like anything else may have a random early failure. I learned my lesson a few years ago when I copied some fairly important files, contact information, archived email, etc from the hard drive of a machine that was about to be trashed. Read the thumb drive after the copy, everything there. A few weeks later read the thumb drive again and watched all the files disappear before my eyes. Googled the drive make and model, found dozens of others with the same complaint. Data gone... I was pissed, but you are always reminded, make multiple backup copies of anything you want to have in the future.

Given that, the number of writes you are doing to a USB stick or SD card is probably far less than your computer drive, so exceeding the write cycle life of one of those is unlikely. I have wondered about SD cards in security camera which keep getting overwritten, (and I guess Rasberry PI's) but they are not typical.

[Dat Ei]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

I've never heard or read of a longtime backup or archive solution in professional IT that uses flash memory. I can only recommend to use multiple harddrives.


Dat Ei

[linkman]

Re: my experience with ripping pristine old CD's

Anybody know if Micro-SD cards also loose what is in them?

Typically nobody uses flash for long-term storage purposes, partially due to the high cost per megabyte. Most who have analyzed the potential for it for long-term say to stay away from it. The article linked below states:

"The JEDEC JESD218A endurance specification states that if flash power off temperature is at 25 degrees C then retention is 101 weeks—that isn’t quite 2 years. So it appears conventional flash memory may not have good media archive life and should only be used for storing transitory data."

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomcoughlin/2014/06/29/keeping-data-for-a-long-time/*163847615e26

Your best chances for extremely long-term archival is to use M-Disc BD-R and DVD+R write-once discs.